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A Framework for Assessing Climate Change Impacts on Water and Watershed Systems

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Abstract

In this article we present a framework for assessing climate change impacts on water and watershed systems to support management decision-making. The framework addresses three issues complicating assessments of climate change impacts—linkages across spatial scales, linkages across temporal scales, and linkages across scientific and management disciplines. A major theme underlying the framework is that, due to current limitations in modeling capabilities, assessing and responding to climate change should be approached from the perspective of risk assessment and management rather than as a prediction problem. The framework is based generally on ecological risk assessment and similar approaches. A second theme underlying the framework is the need for close collaboration among climate scientists, scientists interested in assessing impacts, and resource managers and decision makers. A case study illustrating an application of the framework is also presented that provides a specific, practical example of how the framework was used to assess the impacts of climate change on water quality in a mid-Atlantic, U.S., watershed.

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Acknowledgments

We are very grateful to our colleagues Susan Julius, Jordan West, Geoffrey Blate, Britta Bierwagen, and Anne Grambsch at the EPA Global Change Research Program, and Lewis Linker from the EPA Chesapeake Bay Program Office, for their many thoughtful comments while preparing this manuscript. We also acknowledge the support of Jack Kittle, John Imhoff, Mark Gray, and Paul Hummel of Aqua Terra Consultants for their expert assistance with the BASINS CAT tool and Monocacy assessment. Thanks to three reviewers for their thoughtful comments and suggestions that have significantly improved this article. The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

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  1. U.S. EPA Office of Research and Development, Global Change Research Program, Washington, DC, USA

    Thomas E. Johnson & Christopher P. Weaver

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  1. Thomas E. Johnson
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Correspondence to Thomas E. Johnson.

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Johnson, T.E., Weaver, C.P. A Framework for Assessing Climate Change Impacts on Water and Watershed Systems. Environmental Management 43, 118–134 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00267-008-9205-4

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